DRAMATIC PHOTOS - THE BRUTALITY & BEAUTY OF AUSTRALIA'S CHANGING SEASONS -from the inbox

These images, showing the elements at their wildest and most magnificent, have been released in a new calendar.
Each year the Bureau of Meteorology and Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society organizes a competition for the best weather pictures

 

January: An electrical storm perfectly complements fireworks launched to mark Australia Day 2012 celebrations in Perth, in a stunning shot by Matthew Titmanis

February: A thunderstorm sweeps over the Melbourne suburb of Carrum Downs, captured by Flavio Bonicelli

 

March: Sunset highlights streets of stratocumulus over Buninyong, central Victoria by Keith Day

 

April: Majesty and threat - A cumulonimbus with anvil seen beyond wind turbines at Burra, SA by photographer Helen Simpson


 

May: Ship in sea fog off McCrae, Port Phillip Bay, Victoria, by photographer Meredith Banhidi

 

June: In the wake of a thunderstorm, hail blankets paddocks at Marong, Victoria by John Allen

 

July: A squall line associated with a thunderstorm over Era Beach, south of Sydney by photographer Bruce Cooper

 

August: The ethereal beauty of a mist bow and fog at Mount Anne in Tasmania by Grant Dixon

September: A massive dust storm rolls over the Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary in the northern Flinders Ranges of South Australia, in this stunning photograph by Peter MacDonald

 

October: A thunderstorm threatens the Gold Coast, Queensland by photographer Ann Van Breemen

 

November: The shadows of cumulus clouds dapple the parallel dunes of the Simpson Desert by Steve Strike

 

December: Lightning illuminates a cumulonimbus cloud over Corio Bay, Victoria by James Collier